Action Figures 25% off in the Blizzard Gear StoreIf you've always wanted some Blizzard Action Figures, now is the time! They are currently 25% off in the Gear Store, so you can pick up some action figures for as little as $13 plus shipping and handling. Update: 6.11pm EST: Blizzard has tweeted that the sale ends June 23.

There's no official word from Blizzard on when this sale might end, so if you're in dire need of a Headless Horseman figurine, it may be advisable to act sooner rather than later.

Alas, there is still no Gear Store outside the US, so prepare to pay more for international shipping if it applies.

Game Responsiveness Improved in WarlordsTechnical Game Designer Chadd "Celestalon" Nervig posted regarding some notable improvements to game performance coming in Warlords of Draenor. These improvements will mean that the game responds far faster to all player inputs and actions, and will have a good impact on issues like AoE effects not ending where their visual does, boss ability hits, interrupts in PvP, and much more.

I know this is a very open question, but is there anything "under the hood" with the responsiveness changes that could impact theorycrafting? :)

I was wondering when this'd get brought up. I've hinted about this in the past in a couple interviews... Yes, there was a very significant underlying change here, that may have implications for theorycrafting (though minor).

I don't want to get too deep into the under-the-hood workings of WoW servers, but here's a super short version. Any action that one unit takes on another different unit used to be processed in batches every 400ms. Some very attentive people may have noticed that healing yourself would give you the health instantly (minus client\/server latency), whereas healing another unit would incur a delay of between 0ms and 400ms (again, on top of client\/server latency). Same with damaging, applying auras, interrupting, knocking back, etc.

That delay can feel bad just due to the somewhat laggy responsiveness feeling, but also because the state of things can change during that time. For example: Holly the Holy Priest is healing Punky the Brewmaster. Punky spikes low, and Holly hits Guardian Spirit in a panic. The server verifies that Holly is able to cast it, and that Punky is alive (great!). The cast goes off, Guardian Spirit goes on cooldown, and a request is placed for the Guardian Spirit aura (that prevents dying) to be placed on Punky. That request will be filled next time the 400ms timer loops, which happens to be 320ms from now. 250ms later, the boss lands another hit on on Punky. Punky dies. Sadface. Another 70ms goes by, and the Guardian Spirit aura request pops up, and goes "Hey guys, I'm here!... Aww... damn, I missed the party. Sadface."

We no longer batch them up like that. We just do it as fast as we can, which usually amounts to between 1ms and 10ms later. It took a considerable amount of work to get it working that way, but we're very pleased with the results so far; the game feels noticeably more responsive.

I can't guarantee that you'll never ever again run into cases where Guardian Spirit went on cooldown and the tank still died... but it'll be literally 40x rarer than before, and the whole game will feel more responsive too.

ZAM's Qelric writes on Frostfire Ridge GameplayOur sister site ZAM's Blizzard writer, Qelric, has put together her initial gameplay impressions on Frostfire Ridge. You can check it out over at ZAM.com!

Voice of Gazlowe Blizzard recently shared this video of the Heroes of the Storm Voiceover work for WoW NPC Gazlowe. It's so strange hearing a familiar in-game voice coming from a human mouth, we enjoyed the video so we thought we'd share it!

Heroes of the Storm Goes GlobalThe Heroes team have posted a blog today with updates on the status of the Technical Alpha -- it's going global! Heroes Alpha is being released to Europe, Latin America, South East Asia, Australia, and New Zealand as well as continuing in North America. If you're interested in testing, make sure your Beta Preferences are up to date, and as ever, remember that there are no keys, accounts are being flagged instead!

Patch Note TweetsWe know it's hard to keep up with tweet traffic, especially at busy times like this, so we've put together a post sorting all the tweets since our last update into easy-to-read tabs. And of course there's the Wowhead Blue Tweet Tracker and @WowheadTweets on Twitter!

Commenti

Commento di PragmaticSoul

on 2014-06-19T17:52:51-05:00

So, when are we going to find what end-game questing is like?\r\rI keep seeing, "there's so much to do, you won't miss flying."\r\rSure. I didn't much miss flying in MoP, as I leveled from 85 to 90.\r\rBut at 90, as I was doing the daily quests... for the 30th time?\r\rDarn tooting I loved having flying, by that point.

Commento di Kharnamatic

on 2014-06-19T18:09:42-05:00

\r\rDarn tooting I loved having flying, by that point.\r\rYup, you might as well play wildstar if there's no flying in wod.

Commento di BigH

on 2014-06-19T18:59:58-05:00

Punky the Brewmaster

Awesome :D I wish I had thought of that when I made a monk. Well that and that I enjoyed tanking on a monk :\/

@Celestalon Rumor has it that all the druid travel form is going to be "smart" in WoD, any truth to this?What do they mean by "smart"? Like if I'm ooc and running it'll auto change me into a deer, or if I'm outside and falling I'll auto change to flight form?

Commento di PragmaticSoul

on 2014-06-19T20:10:48-05:00

\r@Celestalon Rumor has it that all the druid travel form is going to be "smart" in WoD, any truth to this?\rWhat do they mean by "smart"?\r\rIf you're in water, it'll be swimming form.\r\rIf you're in a flying zone, it'll be flight form.\r\rOtherwise, it'll be travel form (stag).\r\rThe Glyph of the Stag (being rideable by a group member) is separate form from travel form.\r\rPeople worry that it's going to override our choices. Like, "I want to be a stag and run along the ground; if I jump, will I switch to flight form?"

Commento di oliviadgrace

on 2014-06-19T20:33:01-05:00

\r@Celestalon Rumor has it that all the druid travel form is going to be "smart" in WoD, any truth to this?\rWhat do they mean by "smart"?\r\rIf you're in water, it'll be swimming form.\r\rIf you're in a flying zone, it'll be flight form.\r\rOtherwise, it'll be travel form (stag).\r\rThe Glyph of the Stag (being rideable by a group member) is separate form from travel form.\r\rPeople worry that it's going to override our choices. Like, "I want to be a stag and run along the ground; if I jump, will I switch to flight form?"\r\rWhat if I jump off a really tall thing? OK what if I jump off a 2-level building? OK, what about a 3-level one? It's a valid concern, I'm not trying to belittle, just thinking out loud. \r\rI'm wondering if this means druids in bird form will be shifted into a land-based form when they land to gather herbs or mine.

Commento di PragmaticSoul

on 2014-06-19T20:47:14-05:00

What if I jump off a really tall thing? OK what if I jump off a 2-level building? OK, what about a 3-level one? It's a valid concern, I'm not trying to belittle, just thinking out loud. \r\rI'm wondering if this means druids in bird form will be shifted into a land-based form when they land to gather herbs or mine.\r\rI'm just hoping they solve the "aquatic form breaches surface... and turns off, so you have to cast it again" problem.\r\rI chose Glyph of the Orca because I am a Brinian (i.e., fan of David Brin's Uplift Universe), so I want to be a cetacean when I swim, dagnabbit! :-)

Commento di Adamsm

on 2014-06-19T20:49:37-05:00

So, when are we going to find what end-game questing is like?\r\rI keep seeing, "there's so much to do, you won't miss flying."\r\rSure. I didn't much miss flying in MoP, as I leveled from 85 to 90.\r\rBut at 90, as I was doing the daily quests... for the 30th time?\r\rDarn tooting I loved having flying, by that point.\r\rWhen they progress past the two opening starting zones? Usually there are caps for each testing zone, and they've done the two entrance zones so far. Patience grasshopper all will be revealed soon.

Commento di BigH

on 2014-06-19T21:05:21-05:00

\r@Celestalon Rumor has it that all the druid travel form is going to be "smart" in WoD, any truth to this?\rWhat do they mean by "smart"?\r\rIf you're in water, it'll be swimming form.\r\rIf you're in a flying zone, it'll be flight form.\r\rOtherwise, it'll be travel form (stag).\r\rThe Glyph of the Stag (being rideable by a group member) is separate form from travel form.\r\rPeople worry that it's going to override our choices. Like, "I want to be a stag and run along the ground; if I jump, will I switch to flight form?"\r\rWhat if I jump off a really tall thing? OK what if I jump off a 2-level building? OK, what about a 3-level one? It's a valid concern, I'm not trying to belittle, just thinking out loud. \r\rI'm wondering if this means druids in bird form will be shifted into a land-based form when they land to gather herbs or mine.\rYeah, that's kind of my issue with "smart" shifting. In all but a few life or death edge cases (I jump off a cliff but somehow pulled my form macro off my bar and need to scramble for the button) I don't see the use. It WILL be handy for something like swimming form, as long as it overrides when you're attacking something so you're not constantly switching in free GCDs. But that's about it that I can see.\rWhat if I jump off a really tall thing? OK what if I jump off a 2-level building? OK, what about a 3-level one? It's a valid concern, I'm not trying to belittle, just thinking out loud. \r\rI'm wondering if this means druids in bird form will be shifted into a land-based form when they land to gather herbs or mine.\r\r\rI'm just hoping they solve the "aquatic form breaches surface... and turns off, so you have to cast it again" problem.\r\r\rI hope so, that is really annoying.

Commento di Harvoc2

on 2014-06-19T21:20:18-05:00

"@JalopyWoW Yes, WW as a filler." \r\rLOL WARRIORS GOT SHAFTED! I like how Holinka's response to the problem of using WW as a filler is that it breaks CC is to not WW when there's CC on a nearby target...Yes, let's make warriors rage cap forever if ANY nearby target is CCed nearby. If they can't see that this is a major problem, then warriors, at least Arms ones, are back to being !@#$ like in Cata and 5.2 through 5.4

Commento di Rankkor

on 2014-06-20T01:37:04-05:00

@Celestalon Rumor has it that all the druid travel form is going to be "smart" in WoD, any truth to this?What do they mean by "smart"?

If you're in water, it'll be swimming form.

If you're in a flying zone, it'll be flight form.

Otherwise, it'll be travel form (stag).

The Glyph of the Stag (being rideable by a group member) is separate form from travel form.

People worry that it's going to override our choices. Like, "I want to be a stag and run along the ground; if I jump, will I switch to flight form?"

What if I jump off a really tall thing? OK what if I jump off a 2-level building? OK, what about a 3-level one? It's a valid concern, I'm not trying to belittle, just thinking out loud.

Me thinks you'll just be a bird in all of those scenarios, unless you are in a zone that doesn't allow flying (such as Draenor, Instances, BGs, etc). Just by pressing the Travel Form button, you'll be a bird by default everywhere, unless you're in the water, or in a place that doesn't allow flying.

I'm wondering if this means druids in bird form will be shifted into a land-based form when they land to gather herbs or mine.

If what I understood of their explanation holds, then no, you wont be shifted. You'll be a bird by default everywhere, except in water, and in zones where flight is not allowed.

Of course, any druid below lvl 60 and who hasn't yet unlocked flight in the first place, will be stuck with the stag form unless they're in the water. Ditto for druids in pandaria who are not 90 yet, from 85 to 90 as long as you're in pandaria, travel form will be stag by default except on water.

Commento di oliviadgrace

on 2014-06-20T10:42:46-05:00

What if I jump off a really tall thing? OK what if I jump off a 2-level building? OK, what about a 3-level one? It's a valid concern, I'm not trying to belittle, just thinking out loud. \r\rI'm wondering if this means druids in bird form will be shifted into a land-based form when they land to gather herbs or mine.\r\rI'm just hoping they solve the "aquatic form breaches surface... and turns off, so you have to cast it again" problem.\r\rI chose Glyph of the Orca because I am a Brinian (i.e., fan of David Brin's Uplift Universe), so I want to be a cetacean when I swim, dagnabbit! :-)\r\rI also love the walrus jump and therefore completely agree with this. Happy walrus leaps for everyone!

Commento di PragmaticSoul

on 2014-06-20T11:20:32-05:00

Of course, any druid below lvl 60 and who hasn't yet unlocked flight in the first place, will be stuck with the stag form unless they're in the water. Ditto for druids in pandaria who are not 90 yet, from 85 to 90 as long as you're in pandaria, travel form will be stag by default except on water.\r\rIf you have flight form available, you can always use Glyph of the Stag to "force" a ground-based travel form (the stag, but also ride-able). That takes one of the minor glyphs, though, and with Glyph of Orca (because I'm NOT being a walrus-y thing! :-), that's 2\/3 of my minor glyphs taken up.\r\rHmmm... Wonder if we'll get a FOURTH set of glyph slots at level 100, since we get them every 25 levels?